Is the US Navy Big Enough?

MEMBER

It seems to be time for another round of the periodical “is the U.S. Navy big enough?” debate, which sweeps across the American defense commentator community at least once a year and usually fails to yield any significant new insights.

As I noted here, the U.S. Navy is requesting $161 billion (a $11.8 billion increase) in funds for the next fiscal year. Some of the procurement highlights outlined in the budget include three new Littoral Combat Ships, and two Virginia-class attack submarines, among other things. At the end of the decade the fleet will number greater than 300 ships, according to Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus.

The usual modus operandi in the “is the U.S. Navy big enough” discourse is that an outsider or “non-expert” puts forward the sweeping proposition that U.S. naval forces are adequate given their likely opponents in a future conflict. Meanwhile, an insider (a retired naval officer or former Pentagon official now working for a DC-based think tank) urges readers to take heed of the Cassandra-like warnings from him and his peers about the true state of the United States Navy, religiously noting its unique contribution in upholding the current international order while simultaneously emphasizing the growing technical capabilities of naval competitors.

MEMBER

The technical attributes of the US navy is not large enough. The ship power, well the only other navies that I know that were stronger were doing war time. However, you have to remember out of those 300 ships they are spread all over the place.

MEMBER

I think that we ought to be going with the advice of the outsiders. As you noted,Naval veterans seem to have a religious-like devotion to a particular line of reason. This is obviously because they spent many years being trained this particular line. I would say that there is no branch of the military that needs to be larger. Instead, maybe we could reduce the size of our Navy and encourage other countries to pick up the slack. American military might is what has turned other countries against us. Even if they agree with what we are doing, they will point at our military and talk about how it is just a tool for building an empire. We need to spread the military forces that are currently fighting over to more countries so that they can be our equals and they can no longer accuse of us being a bully.

Features
DSRVs are designed for quick deployment in the event of a submarine accident. DSRVs are transportable by truck, aircraft, ship, or by specially configured attack submarine. At the accident site, the DSRV works with either a "mother ship" or a "mother submarine." The DSRV dives, conducts a sonar search, and attaches to the disabled submarine's hatch. DSRVs can embark up to 24 personnel for transfer to the "mother" vessel.

The DSRV also has an arm to clear hatches on a disabled submarine and a combined gripper and cable cutter. The gripper is able to lift 1,000 pounds.

SENIOR MEMBER

Description
LCS is a fast, agile, focused-mission platform designed for operation in near-shore environments yet capable of open-ocean operation. It is designed to defeat asymmetric "anti-access" threats such as mines, quiet diesel submarines and fast surface craft.

The LCS class consists of two variants, the Freedom variant and the Independence variant - designed and built by two industry teams. The Freedom variant team is led by Lockheed Martin (for the odd-numbered hulls, e.g. LCS 1). The Independence variant team is being led by General Dynamics, Bath Iron Works (LCS 2 and LCS 4) and Austal USA (for the subsequent even-numbered hulls).

The LCS seaframes will be outfitted with reconfigurable payloads, called mission modules (made up of mission systems and support equipment), which can be changed out quickly. These modules combine with crew detachments and aviation assets to become complete mission packages, which will deploy manned and unmanned vehicles and sensors in support of mine countermeasures, anti-submarine warfare, or surface warfare missions.

NEW RECRUIT

Yep, our navy is definitely big enough. Compared to other superpowers, our navy is extremely massive and we've spent billions of dollars continually improving it. Sometimes, it feels like the government is spending too much money trying to improve our navy, when we could use that money to help other cores of our nation (education?). I believe a few years ago the government spent a few billion dollars buying some nuclear submarines, even though we have no use for them right now.